连丽如

Lian Liru is a storyteller (pingshu) artist about whom limited public information is available, and few details of her life have been recorded. Judging from the ten works collected here, her output centers on pingshu and folk literature. Representative works include Jianghu Congtan, the Pingshu Romance of the Three Kingdoms series, Romance of the Eastern Han, and The Loyalty of Yue Fei. These works mostly draw on traditional historical romances and folk tales, and through the colloquial narration characteristic of pingshu they unfold historical panoramas such as the strife of the Three Kingdoms, the rise and fall of the Eastern Han, and Yue Fei's resistance against the Jin. Lian Liru's storytelling is vivid and briskly paced; while remaining faithful to historical facts and legends, she develops plots and portrays characters so that traditional stories are both informative and suited to oral performance. Her works are classified under folk literature, historical reading, and culture, offering readable texts through which readers may come to know pingshu art and traditional narrative.